- Jun 17, 2020

Can You Confirm If These “8 Things You Need To Know About Eating Sushi” are Legit?

(Image by Ryoko, I Love Coffee)

1. To maximize the flavor, try eating the fish in a certain order

Correct. It is said Jiro Ono is the one to come up with this way of eating Sushi. That being said, as long as you are aware of this rule, I say eat Sushi anyway. I learned this from my visit to Sushi Nozawa in Los Angeles. My first nigiri piece was Tuna.

2. Don’t rub your chopsticks together

Correct, except the reason is wrong. Japanese don’t rub the chopsticks like people in the US do. It’s just not their custom. There is no need to rub it. I do remember seeing some older men rubbing them, but that was over forty years ago, when disposable chopsticks were not as refined as today.

3. How to dip your Sushi into soy sauce.

Correct. For nigiri, dipping the rice into the soy sauce will make the rice fall apart. It’s not how the nigiri is designed. The rice supposed to break apart in your mouth, not on your soy sauce plate.

4. What’s the point of ginger

Correct. Ginger works as an anti-bacterial agent, as well as a palette cleanser.

5. Wasabi Burn

Unsure about this one. If your mouth is on fire from wasabi, use less wasabi. In the US, people tend to use too much wasabi.

6. Drink your soup

Correct. The soup comes at the end of the meal, not before Sushi. Also in Japan, it is usually clear broth soup after Sushi, not Miso Soup (it’s rare). The reason is that miso soup would be too strong (flavor) that it will take away all the subtle flavor of Sushi.

7. Are Tuna and fatty Tuna the same fish

Correct. One small detail. There are mainly three types of (red) Tuna used for Sushi: Bluefin, Bigeye, Yellowfin. Most fatty Tuna comes from Bluefin, some from Bigeye. It’s rare for Yellowfin Tuna to have fatty Tuna because it does not get big enough like Bluefin or Bigeye.